If you didn't know better, you might think state Sen. Patrick Colbeck was a credible gubernatorial candidate.

Colbeck, a Canton Republican, at least knows how to perform on a debate stage. During last night's Republican gubernatorial debate, he offered decisive-sounding answers to complex questions, touting his own experience as an aerospace engineer to bolster his intellectual gravitas.

Colbeck is a racist, a guy who has repeatedly insinuated with no evidence that one of the Democratic gubernatorial candidates, long-shot Abdul El-Sayed, is connected to terrorists. In a videotaped presentation posted online by United West, which the Southern Poverty Law Center tracks as a hate group, Colbeck identified the growing number of elected Muslim officials as problematic, and sought to link El-Sayed to a secret Muslim conspiracy to advance "civilization jihad."

The idea that a secret Muslim cabal is spreading Sharia law is a well-worn racist trope, and it's patently untrue. Critics of his remarks, Colbeck says, are trying to silence his willingness to expose the Muslim Brotherhood (to which El-Sayed has no connection) as terrorist organization.

It's crazy talk.

And yet there Colbeck was, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with fellow candidates Attorney General Bill Schuette, Lieutenant Gov. Brian Calley, and Saginaw doctor Jim Hines, men with whom I disagree about a lot of stuff, but who are not actually racist conspiracy theorists.

And there he'll be later this month, in a gubernatorial debate held during the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference, sharing the stage not just with the Republican brotherhood, but with Democratic candidates Gretchen Whitmer, Shri Thanedar and El-Sayed himself.

The party did not publicly object to Colbeck's presence on the debate stage.

Chamber CEO and President Sandy Baruah said earlier this week in a meeting with Free Press staffers that the Chamber had promised to offer the top three candidates of each party, per a poll it conducted, a spot on the stage. Because Colbeck came in a distant third to Schuette and Calley, Baruah said, the chamber was obliged to invite his participation.

When asked whether the chamber would provide a platform to a candidate who complained that there were too many Jews in government, Baruah said he refused to deal in hypotheticals.

“When someone is running for office like that, we want everyone to hear what he has to say,” said Lisa McGraw, the MPA’s public affairs manager. “I wanted the gubernatorial candidates to be able to stand on a stage in front of our members so people can see and hear where they stand.”

McGraw noted that candidates’ appearance on the MPA panel isn’t an endorsement, and that the organization does not offer endorsement to any candidate. McGraw said she doesn’t think remarks disparaging any group of people are good.

But, she said, “it’s information providing a view of their beliefs, all of them.”

Colbeck's remarks are unacceptable. It's the kind of race-baiting that President Donald Trump rode to the White House in 2016. With few exceptions, the nation's top Republicans stood by and allowed it to happen, legitimizing Trump's racist rhetoric by default.

There's a difference between silencing someone, and not offering that person a platform. Colbeck can certainly hold whatever dangerous and inaccurate beliefs he likes, and he's free to share those via whatever channels he can access.

But establishment Republican or Republican-leaning organizations that mouth condemnations of racist behavior, but don't suit action to words, send a strong message.

We all know that certain behavior would result in any candidate receiving a strongly worded suggestion to withdraw from the debate: An arrest. The wrong kind of public remarks. Public behavior that strains decency.

What the Chamber and the Republican Party are saying is that Colbeck has not crossed that line, that the prejudice he parrots is acceptable. While Colbeck may not speak for them, that they continue to stand with him speaks for itself.